Joe Biden had to face a difficult choice: keep US and NATO troops in-country for an unknowable number of years, risking more American and Afghan lives to maintain a shaky, corrupt government in a nation riven for centuries by tribal rivalries. Or cut loose and send our people home. Blood would further spill no matter which he chose but by leaving, American blood will no longer soak Afghan soil.

A double-barrelled ‘new Cold War’ is on, with the US-led empire of capital on one side and its rivals in China on one front and Russia on the other. The Canadian ruling class has enthusiastically enlisted to fight alongside its American partners. This camp has been the primary instigators of tensions with China and Russia that could culminate in a disastrous war between major world powers.

As President Joe Biden seeks approval on a $6 trillion budget, it will become increasingly unconvincing to give in to popular misunderstanding and continue throwing “socialism” under the bus. The president and his administration would do better to reclaim and rehabilitate the word by highlighting the proud legacy of socialist activism within the American labour movement.

It is undeniable that the current scope and intensity of criticism towards Israel is unprecedented, and lobby groups designed to silence these critiques are failing to control the narrative as they so often have. Will this shift allies of apartheid like Trudeau and Biden? Almost certainly not. But the world is watching, and this moment will be remembered in future generations as a watershed.

The defeat of the United States in Afghanistan is one in a string of catastrophic military blunders that herald the death of the American empire. Yes this defeat is a familiar and sad story. The tragedy, however, is not the collapse of the American empire, but that, lacking the ability to engage in self-critique and self-correction, as it dies it will lash out in a blind, inchoate fury at innocents at home and abroad.

According to Jeffrey Sachs and William Schabas, there are credible charges of human rights abuses against Uighurs, but those do not per se constitute genocide. And we must understand the context of the Chinese crackdown in Xinjiang, which had essentially the same motivation as America’s foray into the Middle East and Central Asia after the September 2001 attacks: to stop the terrorism of militant Islamic groups.

Although body-worn cameras have become widespread in law enforcement agencies across the United States, taxpayers have continued to bear the brunt of the financial costs associated with police accountability. Officers should absolutely be held accountable for bad behaviour caught on body cameras but the public should not be expected to continue to subsidize it.

Proper respect is earned, not given or forced. Increased police force whether through the use of violence in response to protest speech, as a result of perceived disrespectful encounters with citizens, or labeling public criticism of police actions that result in death as “hate speech” will never bring any moral authority or more respect to police. Indeed, it will surely do just the opposite.

In recent years the Canadian government has adopted unilateral sanctions against a host of countries including Venezuela, China, Russia, Nicaragua and others. Sanctions constitute a form of collective punishment and could be considered a war crime under the Fourth Geneva Convention. This begs the question: does Canada’s unilateral sanctions regime violate international law?

Chinese and American leaders are now playing a game of chicken that couldn’t be more dangerous for both countries and the planet. Isn’t it time for the new Biden administration and its Chinese opposite to grasp more clearly and deeply that their hostile behaviors and decisions could have unforeseeable and catastrophic consequences?